Well, the Phillies first move of the offseason was a huge splash – signing Jonathan Papelbon to the tune of $50 M/4 years. Ever since then there have been a succession of more obscure, lesser marquee names inking deals (Jim Thome, Dontrelle Willis, Ty Wiggington, Lance Nix). Philadelphia’s real Dream Team seems to be taking shape and will debut in the shadows of the failed Eagles 8-8 2011 s...

The 2012 Phillies roster has begun to take shape. At this point it is mostly by addition with a few expected subtractions but look for a lot more changes by end of the calendar year. As of Thanksgiving, it remains to be seen whether Jimmy Rollins, Ryan Madson and Raul Ibanez will return to play for the Phillies next year. Should any of them choose to exit as free agents this winter, the club ha...

As of July 27th, the Rockies are 1-5 on their current 9-game roadtrip. I felt before they left that they needed to go at least 7-2 to get back into contention. A 7-2 roadtrip would have brought them back to .500. Obviously this is not the case and they are now positioned as sellers at the July 31st trade deadline.
Below is a list of the possible trade pieces (and in Ubaldo Jimenez’s cas...

Colorado’s roadtrip began in Cleveland where they took two out of three from the Indians. The Rockies then made their first trip to the New Yankee Stadium and won the first of three. The roadtrip would end with a three-game slide as the Rockies would lose the last two to the Yankees and then lose a make-up game to the Chicago Cubs on Monday afternoon.
There were some positives to take awa...

Colorado Rockies manager Jim Tracy had a slumping #3 hitter in Carlos Gonzalez at the beginning of June. The Rockies were playing below expectations and Gonzalez was not hitting like he was in 2010. In order to try and wake up Gonzalez’s bat, Tracy played around with his lineup. The major move he made was putting Gonzalez in the leadoff spot.
On June 6th of this season, Gonzalez made hi...

The Rockies activated infielder Ty Wigginton from the disabled list on Friday and optioned third baseman Ian Stewart to Triple-A Colorado Springs.
Ian Stewart was claimed to be one of the best young 3rd Basemen in the National League. Stewart hit 10 HR's in 2008, 25 in 2009, and 18 in 2010.
“I'm just going to try to go down there and have fun,” Stewart said on Friday, shortly aft...

The Arizona Diamondbacks opened the 2011 season on Friday by defeating the Colorado Rockies 7-6 in 11 innings.
Gerardo Parro scored the winning run after Colorado reliever Matt Lindstrom unleashed a wild pitch with one-out in the 11th inning.
Ian Kennedy made his first career opening day start hurling six quality innings by allowing 6H/ 3ER/ 3BB/ 3K.
The Diamondbacks scored six runs (6 IP) off ...

Welcome to the wicked mind of Morgan Spokny, AKA the “Spokester”.
Out of the gate: When asked to explain the Mark Reynolds trade, ESPN baseball expert Keith Law stated that, “My wife’s grandfather recently told us the story of how his mother would get rid of bedbugs in the small apartment where he grew up. (This story was prompted by the recent spate of bedbug infestations in New York ...

The 2nd half starts tonight for about half of the teams (14, in case you were wondering), and Friday for the rest of them (including the Birds). So now is as good of a time as any to arbitrarily assign grades to the team. Unlike some other graders (like Jeff Zrebiec of the Baltimore Sun and his grades), I am going to go by area other than individual player, then expand in the comments below...

It is getting harder and harder to write these posts. There are only so many ways to say the same thing, and everyone covering the Orioles has said it to the point of exhaustion. Let's take a look at what people are saying about the Birds…
The Roar from 34 says…
Good news: The Orioles had twice as many wins in May as they did in April.
Bad news: They won 10 games in May after on...

I probably should have gotten back to work after the last post, since my lunch break was over. But I had the game on ESPN's GameCast, and so I flipped over after I finished my sandwich.
When Corey Patterson homered to make it a 5-2 Seattle Mariners lead, I smiled. It was nice to see him contributing immediately, and it made the game look a little more respectable. When Adam Jones struck o...

The first head has rolled, all the way to Norfolk, VA. In a move that surprised almost no one, it was Nolan Reimold.
I am still expecting Luke Scott to get the boot unless his recent hitting reversal continues (and doesn't plateau where it is now), but this was the right move by Andy MacPhail. I watched the game Tuesday night, and Reimold not only looked lost at the plate, he looked lost in...